


Arrow to the Knee

by CuriosityRedux



Series: Dragon Drabbles Berk [43]
Category: How to Train Your Dragon (Movies)
Genre: F/M, Healer Ruffnut, Hiccstrid - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-27
Updated: 2018-11-27
Packaged: 2019-08-30 03:27:23
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,329
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16756774
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CuriosityRedux/pseuds/CuriosityRedux
Summary: "If you die while I'm gone, the wedding is so off."





	Arrow to the Knee

**Arrow to the Knee**

**-**

It was chaos. Smoke, rather than billowing in clouds, settled like a fog in the skies. It snaked into his helmet, making him choke, and he had to tear the thing away to catch a breath. The sound of fighting and screeching dragons ricocheted around him. For a brief moment, he could only breathe and shove down the fear rising in his throat. How had everything gone so wrong?

“Hold, bud,” he murmured, so low he wasn’t sure Toothless heard him, but the Night Fury slowed and circled the area. Hiccup’s eyes scanned the battle scene, trying to account for all of his riders. Anxiety clutched at him, unable to shake the awful feeling that something terrible was going to happen.

And it hit him before he could even recognize it. It started as color in his peripheral vision, just far enough that he paid it no mind. But then somehow over the rage of war, he heard the subtle thump of a bowstring being released. Before he could search for it, there was a shriek. 

_“Hiccup!”_

He watched in horror as a bright blue Nadder shot by. In what felt like slow motion, he could only stare as the Nadder’s rider launched from her saddle, just in time for an arrow to bury itself in her torso.

Noise faded. Astrid’s hands grazed his saddle as her body began to plummet. Despite the screaming in his ears— one he hardly recognized as his own— he was frozen. Terror clamped down so strongly on his neck that every nerve went dead. 

Luckily, the dragon was able to compensate for his rider’s moment of shock. Toothless dove for the girl, needing only seconds to catch up with her descent and safely secure her in his claws. Just as quickly, he barked a powerful plasma blast at an enemy ship, sending a dozen men into the water. 

“Set us down!” Hiccup called out, shaking back to his senses. He leaned as far to the side as he could in an attempt to catch a glimpse of the girl in his dragon’s care, but she was held too close to his belly. 

Toothless easily located the Hooligan fleet in the smog and all but crashed into the deck of their main ship. Hiccup was already dismounting before the dragon even settled— he was scrambling so much that his prosthetic caught in the rig’s pedal and he tripped to his knees. 

“Astrid!” he shouted, disengaging his foot with frantic hands before crawling to where his girlfriend’s body had been set down. Just the sight of expression on her face gave him relief, but only the tiniest breath’s worth. Her hands were clutching at her side, where the shaft of the arrow protruded, and her face was contorted in pain. She gasped sharply  as he neared. 

People clamored around them, but Toothless pushed them back, giving the couple space. They were a myriad of nonsensical voices to Hiccup. Nothing registered but the blood seeping through her slender fingers. 

“Astrid, what did you do that for?” He knelt over her and pushed back her sweaty hair. Gods above, she already looked pale. He swallowed, but the knot in his throat stuck firm.

Her blue eyes fluttered open. She fixed him in a weak glare. “You were busy—  _ah!_ — worrying about everyone else. Again.” She always said it would get him killed one day. He’d never forgive himself if it killed her.

“Move, move, move!” Ruffnut’s sharp voice cut through his panic. “You didn’t try and pull it out, did you?”

“We’re not—” Astrid was interrupted by her own cough. Hiccup fanned the air around her as if he could do something about the overwhelming cloud of smoke. “We’re not idiots.”

“Says the girl who jumped in front of an arrow,” Ruff muttered, appearing behind Hiccup with one of Gothi’s medical bags. She tried to dislodge him from his spot, but he only gave her a halfhearted glower and shifted out of her way. “Yikes. Could be worse, though.”

When Ruffnut pulled her hands away and began to inspect the wound, Astrid gave a scream that chilled Hiccup’s blood. Trying not to choke on that damned knot behind his adam’s apple, he found her hands and held them tightly. Blood, thick and bright, smeared across his fingers and gloves. 

“Astrid. Babe. Look at me. Don’t think about it.” Why were his eyes burning? Must have been the smog. When she turned her watery gaze to his face, her expression crumpled. 

“Somebody get me water!” Ruff snarled. “I can’t see a thing!” There was a ripping sound, and Hiccup fought the urge to hide Astrid’s newly bare torso from the eyes of the group crowded around them. He tried not to glance down, but his dark need to know made his eyes stray to her side. The smooth flesh where the arrowhead was buried looked unnatural. It should have appeared torn and gory, not merely bloody. It almost reminded him of Gothi’s magic tricks. 

Blinking hard, he forced himself to look away. Astrid’s hands had been squeezing his almost painfully, but they were beginning to feel lax. Her eyes had closed while he was distracted.

“Hey!” he growled, cupping one cheek in his palm. He instantly regretted it— blood stained her skin. “Wait for Ruff to give you the okay. Okay?”

She only responded with a furrowed brow at first, but then the other girl suddenly snapped off the tail end of the arrow. Astrid was shocked awake, arching in pain. Her cry made Hiccup’s chest feel tight. 

“Can’t we get her something to drink?” he rasped. His throat felt so rough. 

“She’s fine,” Ruff muttered, but Hiccup wasn’t sure if she was telling the truth or lying for his sake. “Right, Assface?”

Astrid made a whimpering noise, but the corners of her mouth tugged faintly upwards. “Right, Ruffbutt.” Her chest heaved with every heavy breath.

“How come I don’t get a cool nickname?” Hiccup tried to tease her, but for some reason it was so hard to summon even half a smile. 

“Dickup,” Ruffnut immediately supplied. 

Astrid managed a real laugh at that, even if the effort made her hiss and wince. “Hiccunt.”

His chuckle felt shaky. “What would your mother say?”

Ruffnut reached into her bag for something. Hiccup forced himself not to look this time. “She’d be proud.”

The sound of beating wings and a breeze caught his attention. Somehow he tore his eyes away from Astrid’s face to see Snotlout and Hookfang hovering by the ship. “Hiccup, it’s turning out there!” he shouted over the chaos. “We need your help!”

“I can’t,” Hiccup replied, but it stumbled past his lips, barely audible. He thought it might kill him to leave her bleeding and in pain.

His girlfriend lifted a trembling hand and yanked one of his braids with surprising strength. “Go. Moron. I didn’t make friends—  _oh gods, Ruff, please_ — make friends with an arrow so we could lose.” Her voice was breathy, her face ghostly white, but determination glittered in her eyes. 

He hesitated. “I don’t want to leave you.”

“Why, this?” She licked her cracking lips. “It’s only fun if you get a scar out of it anyways.” Pulling his hand away from her face, she rolled her eyes up to Toothless. “Get him out of here, Toothless. He’s getting weepy on me.”

“Am not,” he hissed, but he would be, if he had to listen to any more of her broken cries of pain.

So he obeyed, pressing a firm kiss to her forehead before standing. It was a miracle his knees didn’t buckle, as lightheaded as he felt. “If you die while I’m gone, the wedding is  _so off_.” 

Astrid gave him another impossible smile. “Same goes to you. Watch out for arrows.”

He took a deep breath. Then jumped back in the saddle. He suddenly had a bone to pick with an archer or two.


End file.
